Because of his surpassing skills as a composer, arranger, and bandleader, Duke Ellington kept his orchestra going when many a swing band bit the dust after World War II. Issued in 1951, Masterpieces featured stellar versions of "Mood Indigo," "Sophisticated Lady," and "Solitude," whereas Ellington Uptown shed new light on "Take the 'A' Train," "Perdido," and "The Mooche." In 1956, Blue Rose—Rosemary Clooney's valentine to the Ellington songbook—was followed by Ellington and Billy Strayhorn's A Drum Is a Woman (a tribute to the Afro-Caribbean roots of jazz) and the Shakespearean-themed Such Sweet Thunder. Ellington Indigos juxtaposed standards such as "Prelude to a Kiss" with evergreens by Rodgers & Hart ("Where or When"), Johnny Mercer ("Autumn Leaves"), and Walter Gross ("Tenderly"). In 1958 came Black, Brown and Beige, Ellington's timeless collaboration with Mahalia Jackson. Bal Masque was a tribute to the songs of the swing era, whereas 1958's Cosmic Scene was a nod to the Cold War space race. The latter is "the perfect merging of improvisation and composition," writes Loren Schoenberg of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem, embodying "the sound of surprise that makes every note Duke Ellington ever recorded worthy of study, and a cause for sheer joy."